


Stricken Hearts

by CirrusGrey



Category: The Magnus Archives (Podcast)
Genre: Arguing, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Episode Related, M/M, cw mentioned child endangerment and abandonment (canon-typical), episode 173 spoilers, rating is for swears
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-06-26
Updated: 2020-06-26
Packaged: 2021-03-04 06:20:35
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,316
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24929053
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/CirrusGrey/pseuds/CirrusGrey
Summary: SPOILERS FOR MAG 173!!!An argument, and a resolution.
Relationships: Martin Blackwood/Jonathan "Jon" Sims | The Archivist
Comments: 45
Kudos: 221





	Stricken Hearts

**Author's Note:**

> _How blind 'twas to be harsh, I know-_   
>  _And to be harsh to thee;_   
>  _To let one hour in anger go,_   
>  _And unforgiven be!_
> 
> _And now- O idiot tongue to dart_   
>  _That venomed fang, nor heed_   
>  _Not thine but mine the stricken heart_   
>  _Shall never cease to bleed._
> 
> ~ Walter de la Mare, "How Blind!"

It feels selfish to turn his mind to other matters when there are children screaming in the streets behind them.

They are a fair ways outside the neighborhood now, sky lightening above them with a pale glow that is too cold to be dawn, and Martin can still hear it ringing in his ears, can still feel the second-hand terror deep in his bones from the few, hopeless stories Jon shared. He wants to run back, to grab every child he can find and drag them with him into the light, save them from the nightmares being inflicted on them by their heartless peer. But he knows there is nothing he can do.

So he turns his mind to other things.

Jon has not spoken a word since their argument on that dark street, and nor has Martin. They walk, pace faster now that Martin can see where he is putting his feet, avoiding each other's gaze. Jon is slightly ahead of him, leading the way as always. Martin cannot see his face, but his hands are clenched around the straps of his bag, white-knuckled against the fabric.

It  _ hurts, _ fighting with him. Being  _ angry  _ at him. And Martin's not even sure if it's Jon he's angry at, not really-

...Well, no, that's a lie. He  _ is  _ angry at Jon, but not for being helpless to save the kids. He's angry at Jon for handling it like _ that, _ for snapping and shouting and acting like Martin's the idiot for still having hope.

There  _ is  _ still hope. He  _ has  _ to believe that.

But more than his anger at Jon, he's angry at the  _ world  _ \- furious at the situation they find themselves in, where they are helpless to save anyone, helpless to  _ change  _ anything, helpless even to lend a small shred of comfort to the poor children who scream and run and hide and feel abandoned by the people who should protect them.

_ That  _ hurts, too, almost as much as the fact that it's a child inflicting this fear. The fact that all those children think their parents have left them. Martin's  _ been  _ there. He knows. Jon does, too, he thinks, though he's never talked much about his grandmother. They  _ know. _ And they're still powerless to do anything.

He steps up his pace, moving up so he's walking next to Jon. He doesn't know what he's going to say, he just knows that he needs to say  _ something. _ The hurt is burning and fierce inside him, and he needs to let it out, needs to share it around, and he knows it'll hurt more in the end if he takes it out on Jon but right now he cannot bring himself to stay silent any longer.

And then he sees Jon's face, and all the words die on his tongue.

Jon is staring straight ahead, eyes hollow and unseeing. There are dark shadows underneath them; lines of weariness and stress he has born for as long as Martin has known him, pressed deeper now with the weight of all he carries. The white-knuckled grip he has on his bag seems almost absent-minded, a sign of an anger he has forgotten to feel, and though his eyes are dry tear tracks still glisten on his cheeks.

"Jon," Martin breathes, and his voice breaks on the word.

"What do you want." His voice is flat.

"Can- can we stop for a bit?"

"I thought you wanted to get to the Archives as fast as possible."

"I think we need to talk."

Jon stops walking; swings around to face Martin. "About?"

It comes out as a snap. Martin winces. "About... all of  _ that." _

"What do you want me to say, Martin?" There's a layer of cutting bitterness over the words. "It's awful? It shouldn't exist? This world is a nightmare of my own creation and I should be able to fix it? I  _ know." _ He turns, hoisting his bag higher on his shoulders and beginning to stride off again.

Martin's anger, briefly faded, rises once again. "Will you stop  _ doing  _ that?"

Jon stops, but doesn't turn. "Doing  _ what?" _

"Snapping at me! Brushing me off when I want to talk! Turning  _ everything  _ into an argument!"

Jon laughs sharply, spinning around again.  _ "I'm _ not the one who's arguing."

"Oh,  _ don't  _ do that. You keep dodging questions and when I try to get you to answer, you start raising your voice  _ immediately." _

"I'm not-" Jon stops, takes a sharp breath. When he speaks next, his tone is still intense, but quieter. "Well, I'm  _ sorry  _ that I have a hard time moderating my tone when I have a literal  _ ocean  _ of nightmares pouring into my head at every goddamn moment. Maybe if you stopped  _ pushing  _ for answers you don't really want, we'd be having an easier time of it."

"Do  _ not  _ put this on me," Martin says, raising a finger to point at Jon.  _ "I've _ been trying to stay hopeful, putting  _ everything  _ I have into not letting you give in to despair, and you just keep putting me down every time I say something!" He slashes the finger to the side, underlining his point.

_ "I've _ been putting  _ you  _ down?" Jon says, incredulous. "I  _ literally  _ know everything and you  _ still  _ don't believe me when I say there's nothing we can do to help, or- or that the situation is  _ complicated, _ and maybe you'd be happier not knowing why!"

"Of course you don't think there's anything we can do, you're clinically depressed!"

They're both shouting now. Jon doesn't even flinch at the amateur diagnosis.

"I'd say  _ depression  _ is a fairly adequate response to my life as it is now! I am carrying a  _ lot  _ of trauma at the moment,  _ alone, _ so forgive me for being a bit negative when it comes to our current situation!"

Martin blinks, taking a step backward as though he's been struck. "You're not alone, Jon."

"Aren't I?" Jon drags a hand through his hair. He won't meet Martin's eyes. "You don't want to hear about the world's traumas, Martin, you  _ really  _ don't."

"I'm not talking about the  _ world's  _ traumas, Jon, I'm talking about  _ yours. _ When I ask you how you're doing, I don't expect a statement, but I am looking for a little bit more then 'I'm fine'." He makes air quotes.

"It's more than a little difficult to separate the two," he snaps, then: "I am  _ trying  _ to keep all this- all this  _ shit  _ in my head, to- to  _ save  _ you from having to know how horrible it is, having to  _ really  _ know." His voice goes soft, so soft, for just a moment, then it's back in full volume as he says, "And it does  _ not  _ help to have you going around talking about how- how this one  _ doesn't seem so bad!" _

Martin rolls his eyes. "Well how was I supposed to know it was  _ children  _ trapped there?"

"You  _ weren't,  _ that's the whole  _ point, _ but you kept  _ pushing, _ and now-"

"Now I am  _ grateful  _ that you answered my goddamn questions!" Martin shouts over him, and Jon takes a step back, as well, and they stare at each other in silence across the stretch of blasted earth between them.

"Oh," Jon says, finally.

"Yeah."

"You, uh..."

"Yeah." Martin swallows. He's talking quietly, and he has to clear his throat and raise his voice to be sure Jon will hear him. "Yeah, I'm, um. Thank you. For answering my questions. I don't  _ like  _ the answers, but I'd rather know. In- in this case. Not in all of them."

"Right," Jon says. He's staring at the ground in front of his feet. Martin is too far away to be certain, but he thinks he's biting his lip, the way he does whenever he's trying to fend off tears. "Well, I'm glad I could be  _ useful, _ at least," he says softly.

Martin takes a breath, pausing before responding. The anger has drained out of Jon's frame: now he looks small, defeated; pathetically grateful to have been of use in some small way.

He thinks back to their conversation in the dark street, to the way Jon's face had fallen, just a little, when Martin had said he wanted him to  _ make things better. _ To use his powers. He thinks of the way Jon had offered to do something,  _ anything  _ that Martin asked of him. Of the number of times he's said he's sorry.

Martin recognizes those tells, is the thing. He's worn them often enough himself.

He steps forward, crossing the space between them in a few quick strides, and pulls Jon into a hug before he has a chance to protest.

"I love you," he says, "whether you're useful or not. You known that, right?"

Jon takes a sharp breath, stiffening in Martin's arms. "I-"

"I'm sorry," Martin says, not giving him a chance to protest. "The way we've been together recently, I can see why you'd fall back into that headspace. I know it's something you've struggled with in the past. But I love you. Even when I'm angry."

Jon's breath is coming hard. His hands come up to clutch at Martin's back, crushing them together, and Martin feels more than hears as he muffles his first sob in Martin's shoulder.

"I'm sorry," he says again, even as he hears Jon whispering the same words into the crook of his neck. Jon just shakes his head, and holds him closer.

Martin pets his hair. "I don't expect you to work miracles, you know," he says softly. "When I say I want you to fix things, I- I  _ want  _ it to be true, but... you're not letting me down when you can't. I don't blame you for being helpless."

A wet face presses into his neck. Martin tries not to squirm, though it is a bit ticklish.

"And I'm sorry for slapping you. People always do that on the telly to wake people up, and I- I wasn't really thinking. It worked when I was panicking the first time and I stuck with it. I shouldn't have done that."

"That's  _ really  _ the least of my concerns, Martin," Jon whispers, and Martin breathes a sigh of relief to hear him speak.

"Well, you don't prioritize your concerns well," he replies.

"You need to be able to wake me up. If that works-"

"It should be a last resort, not a first instinct."

"Martin. I was lashing out. I don't want you to feel guilty about this." Jon's arms tighten around him.

"Well, tough, because I'm going to and you can't stop me."

"I suppose not." Jon sniffles, pulling back slightly so he can dab at his eyes with his sleeve. Martin watches, arms still around his waist, heart still hurting. This, at least, is a familiar hurt. Worrying about Jon has been a constant in his life for a long time, now.

"I'm sorry," he says again. "I hate that I made you feel this way."

Jon shakes his head. "I've hurt you, too. I should be the one apologizing."

"No,  _ Jon," _ Martin sighs, pulling him back in to press their foreheads together. "Please just let me take the blame on this one? I'm overdue to be the one messing up in this relationship."

Jon chuckles slightly, and Martin feels the warmth of it all the way down to his toes.

"Fine, we can take turns," he concedes.

Martin smiles, angling his face to brush his nose against Jon's. "Good."

Jon tilts his face farther, kissing him, and Martin relaxes. If Jon is initiating affection, he's past the worst of this particular breakdown. "Good."

When they part this time, Jon's eyes are dry. Martin wipes a thumb across his face, catching the remnants of tears from his cheeks and brushing them away.

"How are you?" he asks, softly.

Jon hums, closing his eyes and turning his face into Martin's touch. His brow furrows with a considering frown. "Not fine. Better than I was." He presses a kiss into the heel of Martin's hand. "Not angry. I love you."

Martin laughs quietly at the disjointed list of emotion. "I love you too. I'm glad you're feeling better." He cups Jon's face between both his hands, stretching up on his toes to place a kiss on his forehead. Jon's breath catches. "I'm not mad anymore either. Just... sad, I think."

"Me too," Jon admits. He grabs Martin's wrists with both of his own hands, holding him close. "I miss when things were easy."

Martin nods. Things have never truly been easy for them, but he knows what Jon means. He misses Scotland too.

"Hey, maybe someday again, yeah? Once we've fixed things."

"Once we've fixed things," Jon repeats, closing his eyes. He doesn't sound like he believes it's possible. Martin has to pretend it is.

"And until then, we'll just keep pushing through, you know? Even when it's difficult. As long as we're together, we can- we can get through this."

"Yeah." Jon moves forward, hugging him again, and Martin presses his face against Jon's neck and tries with all his heart to believe his own words. They'll get through this. They'll be okay.

After a minute, Jon sighs. "We should keep going," he says. "The world's not going to save itself." His tone is light with false hope. It is so, so obvious he doesn't feel that hope himself, but he is pretending for Martin's sake, and Martin's heart hurts even more for it, that he cares enough to pretend.

"Yeah, alright," Martin says, and when he steps back he makes sure to lace Jon's fingers through his own. It throws their walking pace right off, to do that - moving too slow for Jon, too fast for Martin - but right now they need the lingering connection. Jon squeezes his hand, a light, reassuring pressure, and they set off.

They'll be alright, Martin thinks. It's hard, and it hurts, but they'll be alright.

They have to be.


End file.
